Топик: Missile Defense System - Buren for the United States

Топик: Missile Defense System - Buren for the United States

This is well argued. Its weakest point is the lack of
dealing with opposing arguments.

Thesis: 15;

Summarize opposing arguments: 5

Main point: 15

Particulars: 15

Supporting evidence: 15

Conclusion: 10

MLA style: 4

Grammar, etc: 15

Total: 94/100

The National Missile Defense System - Burden for the United States

Anuar Orumbayev

English I

[ENG 121]

Instructor: Kenneth Ziegler

Arapahoe Community College

Feb.2.2004The National Missile Defense System - Burden for the United States

Since the beginning of the nuclear age, both the United States and
the Soviet

Union have been searching for effective ways to defend themselves
against nuclear attack. In the early 1960’s, the Soviet Union’s superiority in
long-range ballistic missiles forced the United States to reevaluate its
air-defense system. This nuclear race was a major facet of the Cold War between
the United States and the Soviet Union, the war that has been a burden rather
than weapon competition for both the Soviets and America.

The Cold War was still fully active during the
presidency of Ronald Reagan. He proposed a National Missile Defense System.
Originally, President Reagan's plan called for development of a space based
weapons system that could detect and destroy ballistic missiles of any kind,
launched against the United States from any distance, without causing harm to
the people or the environment of the United States. Due to the current
political role of the United States in the world, and especially after the
attacks of September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush’s administration has
reasserted its intention of building this system.

These recent attacks have increased the US awareness of
a growing threat. Proponents state that given the growing ballistic missile
industry in other countries, the US has to prepare itself for attacks of any
kind. They claim that the building of a National Missile Defense will provide
more security to the people of the United States, and will in fact assure the
safety of every citizen of the United States within its territory. Especially
after the recent attacks, this is what the majority of the people want at
present. Even though these reasons seem to indicate that we should implement
the National Missile Defense System, there are many sound arguments against
it.

Currently, chances of the United States being attacked
by ballistic missiles of long range are very low, or do not exist at all. Even
though the United States government suspects that countries like North Korea,
Iran, or for that matter any Muslim state may launch such an attack, these
countries are not in possession of weapons of mass destruction with
capabilities of harming the United States. An article published by Robert
Joseph and Keith Payne of the Institute of National Strategic Studies asserts
that “No proliferant state currently has the ability to strike the United
States with ballistic missiles. If threats do emerge, US conventional
superiority or, if necessary, offensive nuclear forces will deter attacks on
the United States” (Joseph and Payne 1).

Even
though the US government is insisting on building this missile defense system,
the Pentagon hasn’t thoroughly tested the system. Seven tests of hitting an
airborne target were conducted. The Pentagon states that all seven were
successful, and that the US government is ready to start this project. A group
of scientists from Institute of technology explained how the tests were
conducted, and how they were in fact unsuccessful. They clearly state that in
the first two tests, the system failed to distinguish between the target
warhead and a set of decoys that were shaped like warheads. Modern nuclear
missiles all launch multiple decoys along with one or more warheads. After
this failure in the first two tests, the multiple realistically-shaped decoys
were replaced by a single large balloon-shaped decoy in all of the later tests.
In order to make the tests appear successful, the unidentifiable decoys were
removed from the test field.

Another controversial
issue about the National Missile Defense system is the cost to the American
public. This will be the single most expensive project in the history of the
United States, estimated to be between sixty billion and one hundred billion
dollars. Assuming that some parts of nuclear warheads periodically need to be
replaced due to radioactive decay, the price might go up to half a trillion
dollars, depending on the exact system that the US government develops. This
amount will mean more taxes from every citizen, and increase of national debt.
Instead of spending this amount of money building the National Missile Defense
system, the US government would be better served paying off the national debt
to its citizens.

The recent attacks of September 11 weren’t nuclear; they
were realized by using civilian airplanes as a weapon. These attacks claimed
more than three thousands lives. Considering the unavailability of nuclear
weapons at present, these kinds of attacks are more likely to occur than
nuclear attacks. So instead of focusing on nuclear attacks, the US government
should spend the money on security at airports, malls, or other public places.

The
only state that has the power to launch weapons of mass destruction against the
United States is Russia. Although the Russia of today is not the same as the Soviet
Union of 1984, it is still very powerful in the field of nuclear weapons. Some
think that if US starts developing the Missile Defense System it might
encourage Russia to upgrade its nuclear arsenal, but it won't happen for one
reason: its too expensive for Russia's current budget. Cold War brought Soviets
bankruptcy and collapse, and neither Russia nor any former Soviet state would
like to repeat this experiment again.

Right
now the building of a National Missile Defense system should not be among priorities
for the government. The building of such a system however would not make the
United States more secure, because instead of launching ballistic missiles
terrorists target places of high civilian concentration, besides this Missile
Defense project is too expensive for America and it will bring nothing else
rather than huge national debt.